Alex Granger and the Memory Key
by Bookworm Anthrozil
Summary: When Alex Granger's brilliant plan goes horribly wrong, her family is left without knowledge of her existence, and she's left with a quest. A bit AU, but COULD be canon-compliant. Lupin/Tonks; Charlie Weasley/OC. WIP. Please let me know what you think!
1. Chapter 1: Off to Hogwarts

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own the Harry Potter series, though I wish I did.**

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: Alex isn't named after the Alex from Wizards of Waverly Place. Just thought I'd make that clear. Anyway, enjoy the story.**

There are several types of people in the world. There are the ordinary types, who go about their day-to-day business without looking beyond their front doorstep. There are the visionaries, who try to envision the whole world even as they try to change it. There are the eccentric types, who spend time on one pursuit or many, often unusual. They are often the unexpected philosophers among us, always looking for a new perspective.

Then there are the decidedly not normal types. They are the ones with certain unique abilities. And, according to the aforementioned definition, Alexandria Granger was decidedly not normal.

Alexandria, or Alex, as she preferred to be called, had grown up in a small town. She was the kind who always had her nose in the book, and she definitely had the personality of a firstborn child. Those who knew her would have called her a bit bossy, or a smart-alec (well, smart-Alex), or a nerd. Everyone did-except for her very best friend, a clumsy little girl with bright pink, spiky hair whose name was Nymphadora Tonks. Tonks, as she preferred to be called, was looked upon with great suspicion by Mr. and Mrs. Granger, who only allowed her to associate with Alex because they approved of Mr. and Mrs. Tonks.

But then things started to change.

One day, when Alex was about eight years old, she was playing in the backyard with Tonks. They were climbing a tree and had almost reached the top when, quite suddenly, Alex slipped and fell. Mrs. Granger had seen this happening from the kitchen window but, being inside, had been powerless to stop it. She had shrieked in horror, and then terror, as Alex had seemed to slow in her descent and float quite gently to the ground, landing on her feet.

Naturally Mrs. Granger had sworn the two girls to secrecy. She didn't want word of the bizarre event getting out; it could ruin the Grangers' dental practice. They all soon got over their excitement as Alex's younger sister managed to successfully learn to read at her young age of two.

For the next few years, Alex noticed that the Tree Incident (for so she and Tonks called it in secret) was not the only odd occurence regarding an out-of-the-ordinary ability she noticed. Both she and Tonks seemed to be able to do things beyond the scope of normal human understanding. For example, Tonks could change her hair color and facial features at will, and both girls found themselves causing more and more chaos around the Grangers' house.

Finally, Tonks' parents appeared on the doorstep, after a particularly disastrous afternoon in which Alex and Tonks had succeeded in re-raising a flattened cake, pulling up a rather large tree in the backyard of the Tonks' house by the roots, and teaching Tonks' cat Puppy (for so the girl had named it) to walk on its hind legs and somehow causing it to leap onto the counter and upset the cake frosting. Alex had come home protesting that she hadn't done anything wrong, that she wasn't sure why the tree had come crashing down, or how they'd made the cat listen to them. (She wasn't quite as upset about the cake.) Mr. and Mrs. Tonks had sat the girl and her parents down in the living room and explained everything to them.

They informed the Grangers that Alex was a witch.

Naturally Mr. and Mrs. Granger were confused until Mrs. Tonks explained that there exists a magical gene which is sometimes passed down from generation to generation of Muggles (or non-magic people) until it is bestowed upon the extremely lucky child of a seemingly non-magical family. She told them about how Alex seemed to have inherited this gene. And then she surprised them all by saying that her entire family-she, Mr. Tonks, and their daughter, were also magical.

"Isn't it wonderful?" she had exclaimed. "The girls will be going to Hogwarts together!"

Of course, she then had to explain Hogwarts to the two bewildered Granger parents.

Alex was only half-listening to the conversation. She was struggling to grasp the implications of this revelation. _I'm a witch. I can do magic. I'm not normal. I knew it!_

When Alex turned eleven, she was greeted by the sight of a large-eyed owl sitting on her bedroom windowsill, a fat letter in its beak. With shaking hands she took the letter, and broke the wax seal on the back.

The letter told her that she had been accepted to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Only a few short weeks later, she was on a train, dressed in black robes, waving out at her parents and her younger sister. She was clutching a birdcage in her hand which contained a beautiful brown owl (which she had named Aristides). Tonks sat across from her, wearing a sweatshirt from her favorite rock band, her hair bright pink as usual, and petting Puppy, who was sitting on her lap.

Alex grinned at Tonks. Tonks grinned back. Their lives were about to change.


	2. Chapter 2: An Unexpected Sorting

Alex and Tonks practically leaped off of the train, filled with energy from both excitement and the dozen or so chocolate frogs they had eaten. They were wearing their new robes and were itching to find out what houses they were be in.

Having asked around and read up on Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin, Alex knew which house _she_ wanted to be in. Although she valued courage, ambition, loyalty, and a willingness to do hard work, she felt that her intelligence was her defining trait, and she had decided that, if given any choice at all, she would prefer to be in Ravenclaw. She was sure that _there_, at least, she wouldn't be called names for being smart.

Tonks, on the other hand, had told her that she wanted to be in Gryffindor. Her mother, she said, had been in Slytherin, while her father had been in Hufflepuff, but she would rather break the mold and be known for her courage rather than anything else. "I don't have the brains for Ravenclaw," she had mused, grinning across the compartment at Alex. "Unlike you, I can't suffer through thousand-page books to save my life."

They stood in the Great Hall, looking up toward the stage, where an old hat sat on a three-legged stool, of all things. "The Sorting Hat!" Tonks whispered.

"I've read about it!" Alex replied. "Only a moment more now..."

"It sings every year!" Tonks continued, practically jumping up and down.

"Really? I hadn't heard that." Curious, Alex stared at the hat. _Sings? That doesn't make sense—_

But then the hat began.

_I once was just a hat, you see,_

_I couldn't hear or speak,_

_I went about atop a head_

_From week to week to week._

_But then the Four Hogwarts began,_

_And as they reached old age,_

_They wondered, "How on earth will we_

_Impart our knowledge sage_

"_When we are dead and gone?" They thought_

_And thought and thought and thought,_

_Then Gryffindor, the boldest one,_

_Said, "This can't be for naught._

"_Four Houses we've begun," said he,_

"_There's mine, a brave young group,_

_And Hufflepuff, a loyal House,_

_A good hard-working troop._

"_And Slytherin, your House you've filled_

_With purebloods quite ambitious,_

_And don't forget dear Ravenclaw_

_Of bright wizards and witches!_

"_Now we must find a way," he said,_

"_To sort our students when_

_We all have died; when we all find_

_We're dust or ghosts, not men!"_

_So Gryffindor removed his hat—_

_The hat that would be me!_

_And set me down and proclaimed loud,_

"_The Sorting Hat you'll be!"_

_And so I sit upon this stool,_

_Here to decide your fate,_

_Your Houses you will join once I've_

_Been placed upon your pate!_

Alex and Tonks applauded, then stopped short as a woman ("Professor McGonagall!" Tonks hissed to Alex) approached the hat, an unrolled scroll in her hands.

"Anthony, Cameron!" she called in a loud voice.

A small boy with dark brown hair and an extremely large number of freckles ran onto the stage, a combination of nerves and excitement showing on his face. Professor McGonagall lifted the hat above him as he sat down on the stool, then set it upon his head.

After a moment's silence, the hat spoke. "Ravenclaw!"

A round of applause rose from one of the four student tables, and Cameron Anthony ran to join them, his tie, which had been grey a moment before, changing to the blue and bronze of Ravenclaw House.

"Aspen, Cassandra!"

"Hufflepuff!" shouted the hat.

"They go in alphabetical order," whispered Tonks, "so you'll be before me."

Finally, after Goyle, Grant became a "Slytherin!", Professor McGonagall called out, "Granger, Alexandria!"

Alex took a deep breath and walked up the stairs onto the stage, sitting down on the stool. The hat was placed on her head, where it (quite miraculously) stayed, instead of slipping over her eyes as it had for everyone else.

_Must be my hair,_ she thought with grim amusement. Her hair had always been a trial to her.

_Hmm,_ she heard, in the Sorting Hat's voice. _You're clever, I can see that. But you're not afraid to work hard, either. _

_Are you saying all that out loud? _Alex questioned the hat.

_No, I'm just saying it to _you_. Let me see. You're a mite ambitious, eh?_

_Only to be the top of my class._

_But you wouldn't mind going into wizarding government, maybe? Holding a high office?_

_I...I never thought about that._

_Hmm. Oh—what's this?_

_Is something wrong?_

_No, nothing's wrong. You're just quite brave, that's all. And you have a good heart. I think I know where I'll put you—_

"Gryffindor!" she heard the Hat exclaim.

She felt the hat lifted off of her head and saw her grey tie transforming into a red and gold one—the colors of Gryffindor House. As she came down the steps, Tonks ran over and hugged her.

"Congratulations, Alex!" she squealed. "Maybe we'll be in the same House after all!"

Alex, still bewildered, hugged Tonks back absently. _But I thought I'd be in Ravenclaw...I was sure I'd be in Ravenclaw!_

As she walked over to the Gryffindor table, she noticed a red-haired first year boy giving her a thumbs-up. She smiled at him halfheartedly and went to find her seat.

_Brave...a good heart...are those really my defining characteristics? Am I braver than I am clever? I'd never thought about it...I've never had to be brave, not really..._

Her thoughts occupied her until Professor McGonagall called out "Tonks, Nymphadora!" and her pink-haired friend bounded onto the stage. Well, she bounded most of the way up the stairs; on the last one she tripped and fell facedown in front of the stool.

Alex was sure she saw Professor McGonagall stifle a chuckle. "Well, Miss Tonks," she said, with a half-concealed smile, "how...er...wonderful to see that your family hasn't lost its touch for dramatic entrances."

After sitting on the stool for quite a long time, her face concealed by the Sorting Hat, Tonks finally learned where she would be spending the next seven years:

"Hufflepuff!"

The girl stood up, winked at Alex, and headed over to join her House, transforming her hair to match the yellow and black of her new tie.

At long last, as "Weasley, Charlie!" was made a "Gryffindor!", the Sorting came to an end. Alex hadn't paid attention to most of it—she had been too busy trying to figure out why on earth she had been put in Gryffindor.

So it startled her when someone took their seat next to her and tapped her on the shoulder. "Hello," said a kind voice.

She turned and saw the red-haired boy who had given her a thumbs-up after she'd been Sorted.

"Hello," she replied half-heartedly.

The boy didn't seem to notice. "I'm Charlie," he continued. "You're Alexandria, right?"

"Yes, but you can call me Alex if you'd like."

Charlie grinned. "Okay. I'm so glad I'm in Gryffindor. This is brilliant—continuing the family tradition! What about you? Did your parents go to Hogwarts? Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

Blinking rapidly, Alex tried to take in everything that Charlie was saying. "I'm Muggle-born...so my parents didn't go to Hogwarts. And I have one younger sister."

"I guess you're lucky to have only one, _and_ to be the oldest. I have an older brother, Bill—he's a Third Year, see him over there with the red hair?—and four younger brothers named Percy, Fred, George, and Ron, and a younger sister named Ginny, but she's only three."

"_Seven _of you?"

"Seven of us. And we all have red hair."

"_All_ of you? Wow." Alex chuckled. "My sister and I actually look pretty different...here," she muttered, taking out a photograph and showing it to him. It had been taken only a couple days before, and showed Alex, her blond, curly mane of hair pulled back in an extremely thick ponytail, with her arms around a five-year-old girl with brown, bushy hair.

"She looks about the same age as Ron," mused Charlie. "What's her name?"

"Hermione."

Charlie grinned. "I think you're wrong about one thing. She looks _a lot _like you. Only thing different is the hair color. You think she'll be in Gryffindor when she comes here?"

"I don't even know if she's magical yet!"

"Oh. Well, she might be—Ron hasn't shown any signs of magic yet, but I'm quite sure he's not a Squib...that's a—"

"A non-magical person born into a magical family. I've read about it."

"How much _do_ you read, anyway?" he asked.

"Uh..." _Here it comes,_ she thought. _I'm about to be stereotyped...again. _"I read as much as I can," she replied quietly.

"What about?"

_He actually sounds interested!_ "Oh, _everything_!"

"That's more than me—I mostly read about dragons. I want to be a dragon keeper after I graduate."

"Really? That's brilliant. I read a book about dragons, over the summer. Have you ever seen a real dragon?"

"Yeah, I have, actually! They brought one here for the Quidditch World Cup last year—you'll know what Quidditch is, probably read about it—for the Welsh team, when they were competing. Actually it was a wyvern, not a dragon, but who's counting, really?..."

They talked for a while, about dragons and Hogwarts and which foods to try ("Bill says the treacle tart is _really good_," said Charlie). And by the end of the feast, Alex was feeling much more at home in Gryffindor.


End file.
